Hisar Police Range includes districts of Hisar, Fatehabad, Jind, Bhiwani and Sirsa. 340 crime-hit villages have been identified under this initiative.

Hisar Range Inspector General of Police O P Singh, who is the brain behind the ‘Golf with Sarpanch’ initiative, launched the programme at the nine-hole Haryana Police Lines golf course encompassing over 60 acre of land in the district.

To begin with, Sarpanches or village heads of 52 crime-hit villages in Hisar were invited to take part in the programme.

Besides Singh, other senior police officials of Hisar Range will regularly interact with the village heads to take a detailed account of crime in these areas.

As part of the initiative, feedback will be taken from the Sarpanches about nature of crime in their villages, profile of those who indulge in crime, types of crime more prevalent in their villages and how police and the local people can cooperate effectively to curb this menace, Singh said.

As many as 17,000 youths from the identified villages have indulged in incidents of loot, snatching and murder over the past five years, he said.

“They need interventions. When the Sarpanches go back to their villages after attending the programme, their message will have some impact. We want to channelise the energy of youth in a positive way,” he said.

The officer was also the brain behind SPAT (Sports and Physical Aptitude Test) programme which was aimed at attracting children to playground.

Besides this, the Police Range has launched a parallel campaign “Youths Against Violence” to counsel the youth and channelise their energy in the right direction.

“We had called 600 youths from various districts of Hisar Range and interacted with them. We tried to understand their problems and the circumstances in which they took to crime,” he said.

Singh said the police is also being sensitised and asked not to unnecessarily harass the youth as it “worsens” the police-youth relationship.

“We are trying to fix this relationship,” Singh said.

“We need to adopt reformative approach towards the youth who have gone astray for some reason,” he said. PTI